Zoology: Nature's Counter-Sonar

Modern bomber-plane crews know just what to do when their receivers pick up the pings of an enemy radar. They transmit pings of their own designed to confuse an oncoming fighter or trick an attacking missile into veering toward empty air. Such sophisticated electronic countermeasures may be the latest thing in aerial warfare, say Entomologists Dorothy C. Dunning and Kenneth D. Roeder of Tufts University, but the idea is not at all new to non-human flyers. For millions of years, shifty moths have been using similar sound-pulsing stunts to protect them selves...

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